Monday, May 24, 2010

“In the context of patent infringement, the three elements of equitable estoppel that must be established are: (1) the patentee, through misleading conduct, led the alleged infringer to reasonably believe that the patentee did not intend to enforce its patent against the infringer; (2) the alleged infringer relied on that conduct; and (3) due to its reliance, the alleged infringer would be materially prejudiced if the patentee were permitted to proceed with its charge of infringement.”

“Misleading ‘conduct’ may include specific statements, action, inaction, or silence when there was an obligation to speak.”

“[The accused infringer] need not show a total loss of value in order to show material prejudice. Prejudice may be shown by a change of economic position flowing from actions taken or not taken by the patentee”

Friday, May 14, 2010

“[T]he touchstone of constitutional standing in a patent infringement suit is whether a party can establish that it has an exclusionary right in a patent that, if violated by another, would cause the party holding the exclusionary right to suffer legal injury.”

“[A] licensee is an exclusive licensee of a patent if it holds any of the exclusionary rights that accompany a patent.”

“Because an exclusive licensee derives its standing from the exclusionary rights it holds, it follows that its standing will ordinarily be coterminous with those rights. Depending on the scope of its exclusionary rights, an exclusive licensee may have standing to sue some parties and not others. For example, an exclusive licensee lacks standing to sue a party for infringement if that party holds a preexisting license under the patent to engage in the allegedly infringing activity. Similarly, an exclusive licensee lacks standing to sue a party who has the ability to obtain such a license from another party with the right to grant it. In both of these scenarios, the exclusive licensee does not have an exclusionary right with respect to the alleged infringer and thus is not injured by that alleged infringer. But if an exclusive licensee has the right to exclude others from practicing a patent, and a party accused of infringement does not possess, and is incapable of obtaining, a license of those rights from any other party, the exclusive licensee’s exclusionary right is violated."

"This court therefore holds that an exclusive licensee does not lack constitutional standing to assert its rights under the licensed patent merely because its license is subject not only to rights in existence at the time of the license but also to future licenses that may be granted only to parties other than the accused. If the accused neither possesses nor can obtain such a license, the exclusive licensee’s exclusionary rights with respect to that accused party are violated by any acts of infringement that such party is alleged to have committed, and the injury predicate to constitutional standing is met.”

“A patent owner may transfer all substantial rights in the patents-in-suit, in which case the transfer is tantamount to an assignment of those patents to the exclusive licensee, conferring standing to sue solely on the licensee.”

“[A] patent owner may grant an exclusive license to his patents under such terms that the license is tantamount to an assignment of the patents to the exclusive licensee. This happens when the exclusive license transfers ‘all substantial rights’ in the patents.

“When [all substantial rights are transferred], the exclusive licensee has sole standing to sue those suspected of infringing the patents’ claims.

“[W]here an exclusive license transfers less than ‘all substantial rights’ in the patents to the exclusive licensee, the exclusive licensee may still be permitted to bring suit against infringers, but the patent owner is an indispensable party who must be joined.”

“[T]he question is whether the license agreement transferred sufficient rights to the exclusive licensee to make the licensee the owner of the patents in question. If so, the licensee may sue but the licensor may not. If not, the licensor may sue, but the licensee alone may not. When there is an exclusive license agreement, as opposed to a nonexclusive license agreement, but the exclusive license does not transfer enough rights to make the licensee the patent owner, either the licensee or the licensor may sue, but both of them generally must be joined as parties to the litigation.”

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

“Obviousness is a question of law based on underlying factual inquiries including: (1) the scope and content of the prior art; (2) the level of ordinary skill in the art; (3) the differences between the prior art and the claimed invention as perceived before the time of invention; and (4) the extent of any objective indicia of non-obviousness.”

“If a person of ordinary skill, before the time of invention and without knowledge of that invention, would have found the invention merely an easily predictable and achievable variation or combination of the prior art, then the invention likely would have been obvious.”

“To preclude hindsight in this analysis, this court flexibly seeks evidence from before the time of the invention in the form of some teaching, suggestion, or even mere motivation (conceivably found within the knowledge of an ordinarily skilled artisan) to make the variation or combination.”

“A particular course or selection is not obvious to try unless some design need or market pressure or other motivation would suggest to one of ordinary skill to pursue the claimed course or selection. In other words, one of ordinary skill must have good reason to pursue the known options within his or her technical grasp.”

“[A]lthough the standard of proof does not depart from that of clear and convincing evidence, a party challenging validity shoulders an enhanced burden if the invalidity argument relies on the same prior art considered during examination by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.”

“When no prior art other than that which was considered by the PTO examiner is relied on by the attacker, he has the added burden of overcoming the deference that is due to a qualified government agency presumed to have properly done its job.” (quoting PowerOasis, Inc. v. T-Mobile USA, Inc., 522 F.3d 1299, 1304 (Fed. Cir. 2008))